Former Public Works Minister David Patterson has accused the PPP/C administration of incompetence in managing Guyana’s electricity sector, arguing that the country’s power supply has deteriorated despite billions of dollars in spending and access to significant international financing.
In a statement, Patterson said more than six years after the PPP returned to office, the electricity sector and the service provided to Guyanese have worsened at a rate he described as the “fastest seen in two decades”.
Patterson said that upon returning to office in 2020, the government repeatedly blamed the previous administration for problems in the sector.
Those explanations, he argued, have not translated into improvements in the performance of the state-owned Guyana Power and Light (GPL).
“Those excuses may have been enough to satisfy their political base, but the familiar chorus of “it’s not us, it’s them” has done little to improve the performance of the state-owned power company,” Patterson said.
He contended that unlike the previous administration, the PPP has not faced significant difficulties accessing financing and has spent hundreds of billions of dollars while, in his view, delivering little improvement in the power sector.
Patterson pointed to agreements signed with more than a dozen countries, including the United States, China, India and the Dominican Republic, arguing that despite Guyana’s access to substantial resources, the electricity sector remains unreliable.
He also highlighted the acquisition of generating sets from the United States, China, Finland and Honduras over the past five years, as well as fuel purchases from Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, the United States and Middle Eastern countries.
According to Patterson, the government has also leased two power ships from Turkey over the past three years, with GPL paying more than G$75 million per day for the vessels.
“Nevertheless, the country continues to endure daily power outages,” Patterson said.
He further criticised what he described as the government’s shifting explanations for the country’s electricity problems, saying blame has at various times been placed on “excavator operators, donkey-cart drivers, climate change, the war in Ukraine, increased use of air-conditioning units and animals”.
“At no point has the PPP acknowledged that the state of the electricity sector is a direct consequence of its own incompetence, non-strategic management and questionable procurement practices,” he said.
